Alanis King's posts - English uPOST

In November, I received a PR email with “#Basic” in the subject and an opening line that began with, “We have some V lit news.” Having been hit so hard with “How do you do, fellow kids?” vibes that I’ve only now regained consciousness, my editors are forcing me to write about it.

The Bloodhound supersonic car project that’s been racing toward a 1,000-mph land record for the past decade was saved from death last year, and for quite a while since, its website has shown the same message: “The new owner has been busy working ... out if its [sic] possible to save the ... project.”

This month, the $12.5-million Bugatti La Voiture Noire debuted at the Geneva Motor Show, mysteriously letting us gaze upon its exterior glory and nothing else. But there was a reason, other than the fact that we’re not rich enough to handle it: The car won’t actually be done for at least another two years.

Anniversaries, in the car world but also yours, are a way for companies to celebrate themselves while also raking in cash with marked-up “anniversary” products. But if you can’t drop a few million on a car like the Bugatti Chiron France edition, there’s still hope: the Hertz 100th-anniversary Chevrolet Corvette Z06…

It’s hard to find much wrong with the 2018 Fiat 124 Spider Abarth, even compared to the more famous Mazda Miata it shares underpinnings with. It’s sporty, fun and it zips around town like every day is a warm summer day.

Perhaps one of the most tedious parts of meeting new people is finding common interests. But Koenigsegg is the bearer of good news this week, because you and roughly 7.5 billion other people now have something to bond over: your lack of a 1,600-horsepower, $3 million Jesko, which is officially sold out.

IndyCar will race at Circuit of The Americas in Austin for the first time ever this weekend alongside some entertaining support series, but not before we get the chance to have a little fun ourselves. If you’re going to the track this weekend or happen to be in town, feel free to join us for a meetup on Saturday night.

Mecum Auctions is scheduled to send three of the late Dale Earnhardt Sr.’s NASCAR race cars across the block on Saturday, each with six-figure auction estimates. But the team that ran the cars described, Richard Childress Racing, told Jalopnik Friday night that the listings are “not what they claim to be.”

Buried in a Bloomberg story quoting a bunch of steam about how Bugatti may possibly one day consider making a “more affordable” (in the context of the ultra wealthy), potentially electric daily-driver model, there was this line: “The average Bugatti customer has 42 cars at home.” I find this fascinating and see the…

More lawsuits around Dieselgate, hope for the Audi TT and R8 may lie in electricity, a potential cash-saving BMW and Daimler partnership on electric-vehicle platforms, a minivan recall and testing autonomous cars with virtual pedestrians. All of this and more in The Morning Shift for Friday, March 15, 2018.

The Honda Civic Type R is the newest vehicle on the New South Wales Police Force in Australia, but don’t think a cop will come after you in it for breaking the hooning laws or trying to street race it at a stoplight. This 306-horsepower hot hatch, law-enforcing livery or not, will be for show.

In a country where the black No. 3 car is about as recognizable as the stars and stripes themselves, it isn’t often that race cars driven by Dale Earnhardt Sr. himself are up for grabs. But if you’ve got some piles of cash sitting around and collecting dust—as most of us do, you know—this is your lucky week.

With a rejection rate that couldn’t even be taken seriously in a rom-com, John Cena’s former Ford GT supercar was listed for auction yet again as of last month—nearly untouched since its last trip across the block. The listing is gone now, though, perhaps sparing the car from another round of hot potato for a little…

Recalls for Takata air-bag inflators with the potential to explode and spew shrapnel, and the more than 20 fatalities associated with them, have long outlasted even the company itself. After years of recalls and recalls on prior recalls, Honda’s North American arm announced Tuesday it’s recalling another 1.1 million…

Some of us still like to live by the motto that manual transmissions defer car theft—a good, if dying, sentiment. But most don’t subscribe to that mindset, so it’s about time automakers come up with a new one. Perhaps that’s why Toyota just filed for a vehicle fragrance dispenser with a tear-gas setting.

When most of us think of Mitsubishi in the U.S., we think of the old days: the Lancer, the Evo, the Galant VR-4, the 3000GT, the Eclipse. Then, we remember that the Eclipse became a crossover, and we’re snapped back to reality with a harsh realization that everything is practical and sad these days.

The 2019 Mazda Miata answers a prayer car enthusiasts have recited for years, by getting more power than it’s ever had from the factory. In going from 155 horsepower to 181, the new model takes the honored, three-decade-old Miata formula and improves it in one of the most obvious, and important, ways.

When the one-off, $12.5-million Bugatti La Voiture Noire debuted recently, you might have had some somber revelations—including, but not limited to, “When will Bugatti ever make a car for people like me?” and “As a kid, I always thought I’d be able to afford the supercars from my posters by now.”

In automotive journalism, everyone from smaller-scale bloggers to the people on weeknight TV has access to press cars: loaners provided by an automaker for a certain amount of time, whether that’s a week or six months. Barring some kind of weird development, we’re supposed to give it back when time’s up.

Formula One won’t just look different in team names and aerodynamic rules this year, although we’ve had time to accept those changes by now. It may also look different in terms of points, because reports are that for the first time in decades, F1 is set to reward the driver with the fastest lap in each race this year.